On the one hand, I like that the 2003 series gave us a human Oroku Saki after the Utrom Shredder was revealed to be Ch'rell, and I like his backstory, design and powers, not to mention his legacy.

On the other hand, I prefer Utrom Shredder because of his history with the turtles and I think the Tengu Shredder stands out less when Ch'rell had been calling himself "The One true Shredder" throughout the series.

Obvious retcon is obvious, that's the first thing that comes to mind for me. There wasn't really any implication in the first three season that Ch'rell was impersonating anyone, they did give enough hints in season 4 for it to still feel organic but it's pretty clear it was an afterthought.

As for the concept and excecution, it's fine. He is effectively just Ch'rell with a different origin and slightly different goals, which is weird considering how they made clear he wasn't Ch'rell (that mystic bond between the Shredders might explain it away but that's a poorly explained concept itself), "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss". He might be OP and season 5 had a rather insane climax because of that (Dragon transformations? I mean, really?), but I'm not against the idea in theory.

As for the debatable human status? I don't care, Shredder was created to be starter villain to be killed off, he's not that deep or interesting in the first place. At this point most versions of Shredder have ended up with a questionable human status, who cares? It's not a big deal.

Obvious retcon is obvious, that's the first thing that comes to mind for me. There wasn't really any implication in the first three season that Ch'rell was impersonating anyone, they did give enough hints in season 4 for it to still feel organic but it's pretty clear it was an afterthought..

I personally would've preferred if Ch'rell created the aliases of Shredder and Oroku Saki for himself, it would've made him the "One true Shredder" like he calls himself but I'm happy with what we got.

I never was personally bothered knowing the Utrom Shredder was a Utrom. It added a whole layer of dimension to the character of the Shredder. The Tengu Shredder played a great role to it. It added more into the whole backstory of the Ninja Turtles.

Although I never liked the belittling of Utrom Shredder via means by the Tengu. How the Ninja Tribunal viewed him as a joke. Turtles Forever though redeemed this in my opinion. I found that Utrom Shredder is more of threat then the Tengu Shredder in terms of goals and aspirations. I prefer the idea of human Shredder, but the 2k3 series was so great it didn't matter.

The Turtles connection/friction with this Shredder lacked for obvious reasons. The Lost Episodes came on around the time I was 8, and I initially thought the Utrom Shreder was back. I assumed he came back as zombie It took until Hun dissed Utrom Shredder to figure it out for me.

What I found interesting about his character was how articulate he was in his conversations. He always sounded cool and menacing to me when he spoke, even if he is a psychopathic villain with multiple intergalactic warrants on his head.

It just made me glad there was a human Shredder
And he probably would've made Ch'rell look like a sheep.

Me too. There was an episode in Back to The Sewers I think where Tengu Shredder, Utrom Shredder and Cyber Shredder fought each other. It was pretty short, but it showed Utrom Shredder holding his own against the Tengu version which I found odd since Tengu Shredder is miles above his imposter when it comes to powers and abilities.

The only antagonist more boring than Ch'rell as the Shredder was the Tengu Shredder for me.

Now, there could have been a lot done to fix this. I think he could have learned about that particular demon and just adopted a lot of the terror it meant, but used a different name for reasons.

Frankly, I think the best thing the Tengu Shredder did was taunt Karai by putting on the face of the Oroku Saki she knew as her father after driving it through the belly with her sword. Which for her, meant killing Ch'rell (though...this IS the guy that got an arrow in the face (between the eyes?) and pulled it out like it was a thorn )

I always thought he seemed kind of tacked on at the end of the series.

In retrospect, I feel like Ch'rell never should have come back after "Secret Origins," and Tengu Shredder should have been introduced earlier. Perhaps he'd have been hinted at as the "True Shredder" within the simulation? It could have created a sense of dread.

There's a whole world out there. When I was your age, I didn't watch television; I lived.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cryomancer

Mirage [is]...a comic about life and how life and the people closest to you just absolutely suck sometimes. It's "adult" in a very real sense, in that it deals with heavy themes that resonate more with adults, not that it's full of blood and titties or whatever.

I always thought he seemed kind of tacked on at the end of the series.

In retrospect, I feel like Ch'rell never should have come back after "Secret Origins," and Tengu Shredder should have been introduced earlier. Perhaps he'd have been hinted at as the "True Shredder" within the simulation? It could have created a sense of dread.

I think an issue that could have been solved is that Ch'rell could have been killed at TCRI, and the spirit of the Tengu Shredder reanimated the body and wore it as a host as a kind of vengeance for the stolen identity.

At that point, Ch'rell could have been the flawed Shredder who felt that he'd been treated with great injustice his entire life, while Tengu Shredder was just the "Bleh bleh bleh, must take over the things, because I'm evil!!" category that dragged down Ch'rell's capability as an interesting, flawed and possibly even tragic antagonist.

So the entire time, Ch'rell would have been dead, but Tengu Shredder would have played the part of "Ch'rell" so well that no one was the wiser, including his own daughter, that is until things slowly start to get a little bit "off". Skip out on Ch'rell trying to return to space completely. The Utroms could come back initially to collect Leatherhead, but stay to help with the Tengu Shredder problem once it arises (and being the first to notice that something really weird was going on with "Ch'rell") and help Karai learn her father's history with a new perspective. She learns about how Mortu and Ch'rell had once been friends, how Ch'rell ultimately had to resort to being a criminal to survive, how he came to hate his people.

Some enormous possibilities were missed with Ch'rell, and one of them was addressing that he was not spiritually at peace; freeing his body of the Tengu Shredder was one aspect of peace. This would also mean Karai learning the truth of his history and reexamining her sense of honor in a different direction than Leo wanted her to, then using that refound honor to bring peace to her father.

I always thought he seemed kind of tacked on at the end of the series.

In retrospect, I feel like Ch'rell never should have come back after "Secret Origins," and Tengu Shredder should have been introduced earlier. Perhaps he'd have been hinted at as the "True Shredder" within the simulation? It could have created a sense of dread.

Exodus and Turtles Forever were epic enough that I don't begrudge the fact that they never killed him off. But your ideas would have been cool, also.

Turtles Forever has its own problems with Ch'rell, and I think part of that was the writers coming right off the tail of Tengu Shredder and forgetting that, for the earlier parts, Ch'rell was subtle and conniving, and even had some degree of patience. Not constantly screaming that HE'S THE SHREDDER. THE TRUE SHREDDER. HE HAVE NO EMOTIONAL STUNTING WHATSOEVER.

And THAT was the biggest issue with any Shredder incarnation in the 2003 show. Constantly screaming how great they were because "THEY'RE THE SHREDDER. YOU CAN'T STOP ME BECAUSE I'M THE SHREDDER AND I'M GREAT." It's lame, it's boring, it strips any version of anything that could even remotely be interesting.

Ch'rell clearly has the symptoms of a tragic youth, but those details are never spoken.
Cyber Shredder was just Ch'rell's memory, in the body that everyone knew him to have rather than his own.
And Tengu Shredder was a very "western demon", of "Screamy McTakeOvertheWorld". While Tengu are actual supernatural creatures in the Japanese Mythos, they're almost nothing like Tengu Shredder, save forthe arrogance.

It seems like they picked "Tengu" from the air because it sounded more intimidating, but "Yōkai Shredder" would have done the job too.

Why the **** would he sound the same as an alien from across the galaxy? Literally makes zero sense. It's like if they cast William Shatner to play Picard in TNG. Totally different characters.

Some kind of magic connection that wasn't explained very well? The only other explaination I can think of is that his real voice was kind of high pitched when he wasn't in his android body, so he just tweaked the android's voice box until someone recognised it as the Demon's voice to lend credibility to his performance. But that explaination might be null and void seeing how they stopped changing the pitch whenever he wasn't in his android body...